Steam Machine and Steam Frame release date is still set for this year, says Valve

It's still unclear exactly when the Steam Machine, Steam Frame, and Steam controller will release

(Credit: Valve)

• 📆 Valve has reiterated that the Steam Machine and Steam Frame are coming in 2026

• 🙏 In an update to a blog post last week, it has said that “we will be shipping all three products this year”

• 😬 It had previously been rumored that the hardware would be pushed back to 2027 after Valve said it hoped to ship them this year

• 📈 Issues over the device’s price and release date announcements have been caused by the volatility of pricing for RAM and storage

Valve has reiterated that it will release the Steam Machine, Steam Frame and Steam Controller in 2026, after a previous blog post suggested the devices could be delayed into next year.

The company’s latest blog post, entitled Steam Year in Review 2025, is a celebratory announcement of everything Valve has done with Steam in the past year, such as tools, improvements and features.

However, the post also mentions the announcement of its Steam Machine and Steam Frame hardware devices alongside the new Steam Controller with some careful wording.

Valve stated that “we hope to ship in 2026, but as we shared recently, memory and storage shortages have created challenges for us. We’ll share updates publicly when we finalize our plans.”

Interestingly, Valve has confirmed to The Verge that “nothing has actually changed on our end” with regard to the release date situation for the devices. After the initial publication, the blog post’s passage was edited to read that “we will be shipping all three products this year”.

Just last month, Valve said it had been forced to delay the new Steam hardware’s price and release date announcement, which is now expected in “the first half of the year”, rather than the previously noted Q1 release window when the products were unveiled back in November 2025.

The reason for this adjustment is because of the uncertainty of pricing for RAM and storage, which has caused the components to skyrocket in price due to the demand from AI.

Valve has said that it has “work to do to land on concrete pricing and launch dates we can confidently announce, being mindful of how quickly the circumstances around both of these things can change.”

Moreover, “the limited availability and growing prices of these critical components mean we must revisit our [Valve’s] exact shipping schedule and pricing (especially around Steam Machine and Steam Frame).”

Valve had previously stated the Steam Machine price would be “in line with the current PC market”, although with the current pricing situation, the anticipated MSRP that we thought has probably shot up close to, or over, four figures.

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Reece Bithrey is a journalist with bylines for Trusted Reviews, Digital Foundry, PC Gamer, TechRadar and more. He also has his own blog, UNTITLED, and graduated from the University of Leeds with a degree in International History and Politics in 2023.